Translated from Portugese by LabourNet

WORKERS REPRESENTATIVES MEET COSIPA'S PRESIDENT

PORT OF SANTOS GOES BACK TO NORMALITY

APRIL 22, 17H. UPDATE

The opening of the negotiations today, April 22, in the afternoon, was little more than an exchange of technical and concrete proposals. Tomorrow there will be a new meeting which is expected to be more fruitful from the dialogue point of view. The representatives of the workers will meet with the president of the steel company, Marcus Tambasco.

Jose Florentino da Silva, president of the Sindicato dos Conferentes and member of the negotiating commission hopes that this meeting could lay the basis to put the debate on the modernisation of the ports back to where it should have never left: the negotiating table, around serious proposals.

The Port of Santos has been running again now for three days, since the end of the strike, on April 19 in the morning. The total normalisation of operations is expected shortly. Today, April 22, there are still 14 ships waiting to enter the Port and be handled.

IN ORDER TO ACHIEVE AN AGREEMENT IT IS ESSENTIAL TO MAINTAIN THE MOBILISATION

To maintain the mobilisation and the national understanding of the need for a national solidarity network is now the main aim of the unions. The worker must also be regularly informed about the situation of the negotiations.

The negotiations which started today, April 22, will be difficult. The whole of the country must be on alert, in front of the intransigent position shown by Cosipa since the middle of March when it announced its intention of handled ships with their own non unionised workforce.

The information in most of the media has been biased and openly back the aims of Cosipa, blanking out all press releases from InterPortuS (the port unions). Some, as the Revista Veja, by Editora Abril, went so far as to announce "the end of stevedoring" in its reports. They take the side of Cosipa openly, as if this was just a big football match.

LEADERS IN BRASILIA TO PUT AN END TO THE DIVISION OF THE PORTS

Trade union leaders of dockworkers from all over the country will be in Brasilia from today, April 22, in order to meet MPs and leaders of the political parties represented in the Congress. The aim is to get support for an urgent vote for a Bill which would include all the areas segregated from Brazilian ports back into the organised port areas.

The Bill, by Vicente Cascione MP (Brazilian Labour Party, PTB - Sao Paulo) was accepted by the speaker Telma de Souza MP (Workers Party, PT - Sao Paulo) and now its urgency should be accepted so that it can be voted on by Parliament. This is one of the ways adopted to put an end to the privileges and appearance of private berths outside the organised ports, which has been used by the companies which want to operate ships without registered dockworkers.

In the case of Santos, the division was made by the Transport Ministry through the Portaria 94/95, which was in breach of the Ports Law, the 1886/96 Decree and the 137 ILO Convention.

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